Windtonvale
Windtonvale is the regional capital of the Frontier Territories and is the hometown, and one of the main setting points for My Little Pony: The Story of Sabregust. Windtonvale is one of the only floating towns in all of Equestria that is able to allow non-Pegasi ponies to live full-time on clouds without the use of spells. History After the banishment of Princess Luna, a group of ponies decided to leave and set up a new group of towns, beyond the 'red hills' (MacIntoch Hills) and create a defensive position there, believing that the disgruntled Luna would escape the moon, and create an army from the strange items in the south, and use them to control Equestria. Princess Celestia granted this and the group of ponies, led by a group of 6 ponies, called the Pioneers, left Canterlot and followed a trail where now is the main rail link from Canterlot to Appleloosa via. Ponyville. They cleared land in some areas, which would later become the locations of Ponyville and Appleloosa. They then passed the MacIntoch Hills though a narrow pass, now known as the Bucki Pass. They reached a large forest belt, just south of the mountains and deserts of the south. They left a outpost here, now called the Meridian Post, and the ponies scattered, half moving west, and half moving east. The ponies moving east found a large lake, and to the south of it, in the woods, were crops which looked frozen in the taiga forest, but were not, and were very similar to the crops back in Equestria, particularly a snowy-like wheat, which when processed, was exactly like normal wheat hay. The Pioneers decided to settle here, but there was a catch. There was no place for the town, except an island in the middle of the large lake. The Pioneers tried to sail over to it, but they realized that the winds above the lake were brutal, and ripped the little dingy apart. The Pioneers needed a new way to establish a settlement. One of the Pioneers, a Pegasus who studied meteorology, realized that only 200m above the lake, the pressure of the air was the same as ground level, the temperature was a lot more tolerable than the freezing conditions of the lakeside, and the wind was neutral, and had the same strength as on the ground in Equestria. The Pioneers decided to build the town above the lake. 'But how?' they questioned. Another of the Pioneers, an Earth pony who was a geologist by trade, noted that the stone at the bottom of, and surrounding the lake was a very unique type of stone, called Cloud Stone. It was called Cloud Stone because it had the ability to support its own weight plus hundreds more tons when placed in a cloud. The leader of the Pioneers, a Unicorn guard who came with them to oversee the journey, thought of a plan. The Earth ponies would mine out slabs of Cloud Stone, the Unicorns would lift them up to the desired height, and the Pegasi would place special, permanent clouds underneath them, allowing the ponies to build the town's foundation in the sky. Then, the Earth ponies mined out a large slab of Cloud Stone, the Pegasi place a permanent, but movable cloud underneath it, and the Unicorns used their magic to turn it into an elevator from the island in the center, to the town above. The ponies then build a retractable Cloud Stone and cloud bridge, used to quickly cross from the shore to the island, and then back to the town above. After building the foundations, in 3 days, the town was build and dubbed 'Windtonvale', because of the powerful and unforgiving winds of Lake Torrent. On the 4th day, they returned to the Meridian Post to regroup with the ponies that went west. They realized that they both made towns, with the western Pioneers building their barracks town of Gallopsburg, where the eastern ponies build the civilian town of Windtonvale. The ponies that came with the Pioneers began to argue about which would be the capital of their new territories. The Pioneers, unable to calm down the settlers, watched on in fear as the argument became bigger, and bigger until, two new ponies arrived in Meridian Post. A royal pony, and his princess wife. Their names were Musket and Windwalker, respectively. The ponies stopped in shock, because they never expected any royal to come so far to see their new land. Musket stood in front of the crowd, and declared that both towns were capitals, Windtonvale was the region and civilian capital, where Gallopsburg was the supply and barracks capital. The ponies nodded in agreement, and the Pioneers were thankful for the quick resolution. The royals were declared the leaders of the towns, but they refused to be called the Prince and Princess of the Frontier. Instead, Musket became Duke of Gallopsburg, and Windwalker, Duchess of Windtonvale. Though they only lived in the towns for 10 years before leaving back to Canterlot on secret duties., they were respected as their leaders of the Frontier, and their offspring as the heirs. After this golden era, Windtonvale, and the frontier in general was in a lot of isolation, and had minimal news on the rest of Equestria, and even less news sent from them. They relied on internal news systems between each other, and were sufficient with self-sustainability. This was until the creation of the rail system, at around the creation of Ponyville, where the rail-layers found the trail used by the Pioneers, and followed the line from the dry plains to the Bucki Pass, all the way to Meridian Post, which then they linked to Gallopsburg and Windtonvale (on a ground-based terminal). During this time, they learnt the unfortunate truth about Musket and Windwalker, which were killed in action after a long period of time in the far south, monitoring a potental threat to Equestria. However, the citizens still believed that the royals that protected them in their first winters and summers, would not forget them and would send their legacy in a new dynasty of royals from the South. After this time, Windtonvale, despite not being known well amongst most ponyfolk, particularly those close to Canterlot or more north of it, they were well connected to the rest of Equestria and had both emigrants and moving frontier ponies, and with a airship service from Canterlot to Windtonvale being provided at around the time of Cherry Scribble , the frontier was now officially on the 'map' of Equestria. Structures Windtonvale, as a functioning town, has many main building and structures in it and landmarks near it. Some of these include: *Snowbreeze Palace - Official residence of Lorikeet and Mariwen, and also the town hall of Windtonvale *RFF Torrent Base - The RFF base for Windtonvale and main flight base for the RFF. This includes the temporary barracks building, the warehouse, the piloting zone and a military workshop. *Airship Wharf - The docks for the airships *The Staircase - A large staircase with the Cloud Elevator in the centre, used to get from the ground to Windtonvale. *Glimmer Beam 's Potion Store *Ratchet 's Workshop and Repairs Shop *Windtonvale School - the school for the town, run by Cherry Scribble *Windtonvale Police Station - current workplace of Scope *Windtonvale Liberay *The Pioneers' Monument - A statue of the 6 Pioneers, all showing their unique skills which helped to found the Frontier Territories *Sky Square - The main plaza of the town. *Windtonvale Weather Patrol - A special station of highly skilled weather ponies, which their main job is not weather control, but weather mitigation and rescues. *Lake Torrent - The mightly wind-making lake below Windtonvale *The Pillar - A large mountain just east of Windtonvale, which is the only thing higher than the town on the horizon. Citizens Notable citizens include: *Cap. Sabregust *Glimmer Beam *Ratchet *Scope *Cherry Scribble *Princess Lorikeet , of Windtonvale *Princess Mairwen , of Windtonvale *Musket, Duke of Gallopsburg (deceased) *Windwalker, Duchess of Windtonvale (deceased) Customs There are a few customs of the Windtonvale ponies. These include: *The Frontier ponies are quite nationalistic about being a frontier pony, because of the belief that they are tasked by the royals to stand watch on the frontier. *Any female royal in the Frontier Territories, who is designated a citizen of the Frontier, would be named 'Princess of Windtonvale' or ', Duchess of Windtonvale'. Male royals would be of Gallopsburg. *Every change of season, the winds of the Lake Torrent die down for one day. The ponies celebrate the mercy of the wind with a celebration called 'The Changing of the Winds', symbolizing how the wind changes it's direction, depending on the season. *The Ponies of Windtonvale believe that despite all their magic and powers, they can't beat the power of the winds below Windtonvale, which control the weather and seasons of Windtonvale. The ponies trust themselves to the lake, and hope there is only one bad storm each season, as even with highly skilled weather ponies, the storms can never be tamed. Trivia *Bucki Pass is named after the Bulli Pass in Illawarra, New South Wales, Australia. It is the main pass from the Southern Highlands to the South Coast, and was known to be a treacherous journey. *Lake Torrent refers to the wind as a torrent of water, because the pattern the wind moves on Lake Torrent is similar to repeat tsunamis. *Windtonvale is a mix up of the London Suburb 'Paddington', the word 'Wind' and the use of the classic regional town ending of 'vale' to not get it confused with Clouds'dale' *Windtonvale was founded before both Ponyville and Appleloosa, but was not mentioned often in those times due to it's isolation. *The Pillar is named after the Roman Pillars left standing in Rome and Pompeii, and is a favorite place for Sabregust to go to gather his thoughts. Category:Locations